faff 



LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 

111 




111 Pill 

014 443 608 8 



Hollinger 

pH 8.5 

Mill Run F03-2193 



F 227 
.P52 
Copy 1 



VIRGINIA FIRST AND LEE 



AN ADDRESS BY 

/ 

HENRY W. ANDERSON 



DELIVERED AT RICHMOND, VIRGINIA 



ON VIRGINIA DAY 



JANUARY 22, 1917 



. A 5% 



'iSIr 



It is the custom of The Woman's Club of Richmond to 
celebrate "Virginia Day" in each year on the Monday 
nearest the ipth of January, the anniversary of the birth 
of General Robert E. Lee. 

This address was delivered before the Club on "Virginia 
Day," January 22, ipi/- It was intended primarily as 
an appeal for the proper appreciation and development of 
the essential principles of American civilization at a time 
when the conditions in America and in the -world demand 
the maintenance and fearless assertion of those principles. 
My labor shall not have been in vain if two or one among 
those who heard or may read this address shall have been 
led thereby to a clearer appreciation of the rights, and 
more especially the duties and obligations, of American 

Citizenship. 

H. W. A. 
Richmond, Va., January SI, 1917. 



Virginia First and Lee 



Among the many evidences of admira- 
tion and esteem which came to General 
Robert E. Lee from all parts of the world 
during the few years which intervened be- 
tween the close of the civil war and his 
death in 1870, was a translation of the 
Illiad sent by the translator, Philip Stan- 
hope Worsley of Oxford, in which were in- 
scribed the following presentation lines: 

"To GENERAL LEE. 
The most stainless of living Commanders, 

and, except in fortune, the greatest, 
this volume is presented 

with the writer's earnest sympathy 
and respectful admiration. 



"The grand old bard that never dies, 
Receive him in our English tongue: 

I send thee but with weeping eyes 
The story that he sung. 

"Thy Troy is fallen, thy dear land 
Is marred beneath the spoiler's heel : 

I cannot trust my trembling hand 
To write the things I feel. 

"Ah, realms of tombs! but let her bear 
This blazon to the last of times: 

No nation rose so white and fair, 
Or fell so pure of crimes. 

"The widow's moan, the orphan's wail 
Come round thee, yet in truth be strong: 

Eternal right, though all else fail, 
Can never be made wrong. 

"An angel's heart, an angel's mouth, 
Not Homer's could alone for me, 

Hymn well the great Confederate South, 
Virginia first, and LEE!" 

This tribute both to Virginia and her 

favorite son, seems peculiarly appropriate 

to "Virginia Day"— a day set aside in your 

calendar to do honor to our native State, 



3 
and fixed with reference to the anniversary 
of the birth of Lee: a day in which the ideal 
expressed in the words, "Virginia first, 
and Lee," must dominate our thoughts 
and claim our loving homage. 

When I received the invitation to address 
your Club on "Virginia Day," these lines of 
the English poet seemed to convey a note 
of warning, for no subject other than one 
connected with Lee and his service to Vir- 
ginia could be appropriate for discussion, 
yet this theme had been adjudged beyond 
the majestic genius of Homer. 

But they bore also a suggestion, that the 
nature of the occasion, as well as the ex- 
alted character of the one fitting theme, 
imposed a duty; that we should forget self 
and all thought of our own achievements, 



4 
and should see in this day an opportunity 
to stand together in the white light of the 
spirit of Virginia as expressed in the life 
of Lee, and seek to draw therefrom guid- 
ance for our own lives and inspiration for 
our own citizenship, that we may prove 
worthy of his example and the highest 
ideals of the state which he loved. I am 
here, therefore, not as a teacher but as a 
student who would seek with you to find 
the true meaning of "Virginia Day" as 
expressed in certain incidents of its his- 
tory, and illustrated in the citizenship of 
Lee. 

In discharging this duty, we are in fact 
following the path which leads to a sound 
appreciation of our state and our own ob- 
ligations of citizenship. If we look back 



5 
over the courses of history, it seems that 
each era or phase of political development 
has sought its true expression in some one 
man who has embodied in his life and char- 
acter the peculiar qualities and ideals of 
his time. When the Athenian civiliza- 
tion had risen to its highest level, it found 
in the person and life of Pericles expression 
of its exalted beauty, before it yielded to 
the demagogues and drifted to decline. 
Rome struggled up through centuries to 
give expression to the spirit of disciplined 
power and law in Caesar, and then the 
light of its civilization slowly faded into 
the darkness of the middle ages. In later 
times we see the spirit of absolute mon- 
archy expressed in Louis XIV, the very 
embodiment of the Machiavellian state. 



6 
The period of English feudalism culmi- 
nates in the strong and chivalrous Warwick, 
and then gives place to other ideals. The 
spirit and impulse of the colonial era in 
America found their final and noblest ex- 
pression in Washington; while the quasi- 
feudal age of Virginia can have no surer 
ground upon which to base an appeal to 
the judgment of history than the fact that 
it could produce the life and character of 
Lee as its noblest gift to mankind. 

Thus each school of political thought 
serves its day and is discarded, but before 
it passes away its ideals are perfected in 
some great character raised above the con- 
fusion of the mass, an example of what it 
can produce, and a beacon light to guide 



7 
humanity along the unexplored track of 
some new experiment. 

These men are more than historical char- 
acters; they are living, vital forces, for 
they embody and express not only the ideals 
of their times, but principles which are 
eternal and unchangeable, thovigh ap- 
plied to constantly changing conditions. 
It is only through a study of their lives 
that we may learn to view the spirit of 
history as a living thing; to see the elements 
of social development in human garb; 
and thus to realize their values and apply 
them in the solution of our own social 
and political problems. 

When we take up the study of that por- 
tion of the history of Virginia which is 
associated with Lee, and of Lee as a citi- 



8 
zen or in his relations to the state, we enter 
at once into the realm of controversy. 

Virginia had been the leader in the es- 
tablishment of the American Union, had 
accepted its Constitution, and had been 
for seventy years a part of the territory of 
the United States. She then undertook to 
withdraw from the Union. 

Lee was a citizen of Virginia. He was 
educated at West Point by the Government 
of the United States, and became an officer 
in its army, taking the oath of allegiance 
to its flag. When Virginia undertook to 
secede from the Union, he resigned and 
subsequently accepted a commission from 
his state and bore arms against the Gov- 
ernment of the United States. There are 
those who believe that, in seceding from 



9 
the Union, Virginia violated her plighted 
faith; and, while readily conceding the 
exalted personal character and purity of 
purpose of Lee, yet believe that he erred in 
his conception of civic obligations and 
failed to discharge his duties as a citizen. 

In any discussion of this period in the 
history of Virginia, or the citizenship of 
Lee, this question must be examined. It 
necessarily involves an inquiry into the 
nature of the state and the rights and ob- 
ligations of citizenship. 

We are accustomed to think of the state 
as a distinct entity, possessed of powers 
inherent in itself which we call sovereignty, 
and free from the moral and legal obliga- 
tions of the individuals of whom it is com- 
posed. There is, in fact, no such thing, 



10 

for the state is but the body of its citizens, 
and in a very real sense each citizen may 
be said to carry within himself the essential 
elements of the state. 

This conception of the state as a separate 
and distinct entity, making laws which its 
citizens must obey, and free from the moral 
and legal obligations of the individual, re- 
sults from long standing tradition, and is 
preserved by the almost irresistible in- 
stinct of the human mind to grasp the con- 
crete instead of the abstract, thus leading 
us to look upon the Government, which is 
but an agency for the accomplishment of 
the ends of state, as the state itself. 

The results of this misconception are 
manifest. Instead of centering our de- 
votion upon the great moral principles 



11 

which must constitute the living spirit 
of any lasting state, we unconsciously 
attach our allegiance to the government 
which is composed of ever changing men. 
We lose sight of principles before the con- 
crete embodiment of power, and come to 
regard the power to enforce commands as 
involving the right to give them. From 
this state of mind, it is but a short step 
to an acknowledgment of the constantly 
recurring fallacy that might is right, that 
the king, or the majority, "can do no 
wrong." 

It is obvious therefore that a clear under- 
standing of the nature of the state and of 
the sources of its sovereignty, is essential 
to an accurate conception of its powers 



12 
and limitations and of the rights and 
obligations of citizenship. 

If we inquire into the origin of the state, 
we are unable to find that it was the result 
of any conscious exercise of the human will 
or intelligence, but it appears to have come 
into existence through the operation of the 
most elemental forces or instincts of hu- 
man nature. 

The ties of blood, the need of food and 
clothing, the necessity for protection, as 
well as the predatory instincts of hu- 
manity, led men of common origin or in- 
terests to band together into primitive 
organizations. These organizations re- 
quired leaders with power to command. 
The strongest were chosen for these posi- 
tions or won them through the exercise of 



13 

the strong arm of might. From the cus- 
tom of commanding and obeying in time 
of war, soon grew the habit of giving orders 
and yielding obedience in times of peace. 
Through these processes the semblance of 
order was established and mankind, ac- 
cepting that to which it was accustomed, 
soon learned to regard the power to com- 
mand as the basis of the right. Thus there 
was built up a social and political organiza- 
tion dominated by force, and the state 
emerged from the mists of prehistoric times 
with the relations of ruler and ruled al- 
ready established, and with the vision 
of the abstract state , lost in the person 
of the ruler. 

The state which thus came into existence 
was not a moral organism; it was a preda- 



14 
tory enterprise responding to the elemen- 
tal human instincts already mentioned. 
It knew no obligations to mankind, but 
was the embodiment of the idea of Cain 
that man was not his "brother's keeper/' 
In the earlier history the conquest of other 
tribes or states resulted in their entire 
destruction or the banishment of the few 
survivors from the land. Later the con- 
quered, instead of being destroyed, were 
permitted to remain as slaves of the con- 
querors, to provide for them the necessi- 
ties of life, leaving their masters free to 
carry on their predatory warfare. Thus 
the social organization was formed, with 
all the gradations of class, from the su- 
preme ruler to the humblest slave, slowly 
to develop through the growing apprecia- 



15 
tion of right and justice, into the yet im- 
perfect social and political organization 
of the modern state. 

Any inquiry into the history and develop- 
ment of society demonstrates with start- 
ling clearness that, at least until very re- 
cently, the controlling impulse in the 
state, if not the dominant thought of 
humanity, has been force, and current 
events have tended to raise the question 
as to whether this is not yet true. The 
sense of justice and right, while ever 
present in the hearts of men to embarrass 
tyranny, and from time to time to accom- 
plish its overthrow, has been submerged 
beneath the impelling power of force, 
which has often justified its actions by the 
claim of necessity. Not only the physical, 



16 
but the intellectual and even the moral 
qualities of men, have been made servants 
of force as the dominant principle in the 
state, have been taught to hymn its praises, 
and to impress upon the minds of the hu- 
man race the duty of obedience to its com- 
mands. 

From the earliest times, the theme of 
poets and historians has been power and 
the triumph of force through war. The 
Illiad opens with an invocation to the 
Muse to sing of Achilles and the "direful 
wrath" which brought to Greece its sor- 
rows, and the whole poem is a glorification 
of war and force. The epic of Virgil, cele- 
brating the founding of the Roman Em- 
pire and giving expression to its ideals 
when the highest levels of its civilization 



17 
had been attained, is a song of force, 
beginning with the destruction of Troy 
and ending with the vision of the ideal 
Roman in the Elysian Fields, clothed 
with "armour of glittering grace," and 
"decked with conqueror's spoils," destined 
to sustain the Roman State midst the 
shock of war. The earlier poets of Western 
Europe delight in like manner to sing of 
deeds of arms as the noblest expression of 
human ideals. 

History has been equally diligent in its 
service. From the earliest times, delight- 
ing to deal with the obvious and failing 
to see or appreciate great principles work- 
ing to their destined goal, historians, with 
few exceptions, have made of history the 
record of battles, and seen in the achieve- 



18 
ments of men the triumph of force. Men 
have been called great in proportion as 
their conquests were extensive. Eras in 
human development have been made to 
depend upon decisive battles, and the 
civilization and civilizing influence of the 
state have been measured by its ability 
to dominate men through armed strength. 
Law, the handmaiden of Justice, yielded 
its sanction to might, and the will of the 
Prince was declared to be absolute; science 
has been one of the chief instruments in 
the perfection of the agencies of power; 
while religion itself has been led to over- 
look or abandon the moral principles 
upon which it is fovinded and to become a 
worshipper at the altar of force. The 
biblical history of the Hebrew nation, 



19 
though rich in moral teachings, is filled 
with the record of constantly recurring 
efforts to dominate or destroy other races 
in war. Mahomet enjoins his followers 
to propagate their creed with the sword, 
and the choicest blessings of Heaven are 
promised to him who finds death upon the 
field of battle. Even the religion of Christ, 
who taught men that they must be 
brethren and love one another and that the 
only permanent foundation for human 
society was justice and love, has been 
distorted by its followers into an instru- 
ment for the forceful domination of men. 
The inquisition, the torture chamber, the 
battlefield, have been familiar scenes of 
the activities of those claiming to be its 
representatives until it has become an 



20 

axiom of political science that of all wars 
those of religion are the most cruel. Thus 
every quality and achievement of man has 
been used to impress upon the human 
mind the claim that might is right, and 
that obedience to those who have the power 
to enforce their commands, regardless of 
the right, is a civic duty. 

It is a mistake to believe that this ideal 
of force as the dominant principle in the 
state is associated with any peculiar form 
of government. While some governments 
may be better adapted than others to the 
development of a sense of justice and 
right, yet history teaches that Monarchy 
and Oligarchy, Theocracy and Democracy, 
have all yielded to the seductive influence 



21 
of force in order to control the life and 
development of the state. 

The history of monarchies has been one 
long line of conquests with successive 
dynasties, first established and then over- 
thrown by force. The theocratic govern- 
ment of Spain gave us the inquisition, and 
the temporal power of the church com- 
pleted the devastation of the fair plains of 
Italy. The oligarchies of the middle ages 
stand as examples of the abuse of power; 
and we, who are prone to regard Democ- 
racy as the agency for the establishment 
of justice, may find enlightenment in 
the fact that the Athenian Democracy 
slew Socrates and degenerated into a 
tyranny; while the Democracy of France, 
established in the name of reason and pro- 



22 
claiming justice and fraternity as its mis- 
sion, placed upon human history the blot 
of the French Revolution, and so disgusted 
the world with slaughter and the dis- 
regard of the most elemental rights of 
men, that the absolutism of Napoleon was 
welcomed as a relief from the excesses of 
an unrestrained majority. 

But you may ask, if the power to com- 
mand and require obedience be not the 
true source of sovereignty in the state, 
from what source is sovereignty derived? 
That the state must have power to enforce 
its commands is obvious. Without this 
power it would be unable to protect its 
citizens, to punish wrong, or maintain 
order. It would, in fact, cease to exist. 
But this power is only an attribute of 



23 
sovereignty, not its essence or the source 
from which it is drawn. As the physical 
movement of the human body is only the 
evidence of the life within, and not life 
itself, so the power of the state is but the 
manifestation of life which has its exist- 
ence within the hearts of the people of 
which the state is composed. 

The true source of sovereignty in the 
state, of its right to command and enforce 
obedience, as distinguished from mere 
power, is the moral sense of its citizens, 
and the relations of right and obligation 
among themselves and with respect to 
other states which springs from this moral 
sense. It is something inherent in man 
himself, greater than the visible state, 
and the only sound basis for its existence. 



24 
This moral sense of fair play, this recog- 
nition of the rights of others and our 
obligations to them, has been the impelling 
power which, though often obscured and 
sometimes seemingly suppressed by over- 
whelming manifestations of force, has 
slowly lifted mankind from a state of bar- 
barism to what we call civilization. Both 
the measure of human freedom and the 
quality of civilization in any state are 
in direct proportion to the vigor and in- 
fluence of this spirit. No state or society, 
however primitive, has been found to 
exist in which this moral sense of mutual 
obligation has not been manifest to some 
degree, and history presents a long series of 
instinctive, though unconscious, appeals 



25 
of government and of power to this, the 
true source of sovereignty. 

Thus we see in all forms of government 
a constant striving for some moral ground 
upon which to base their claims to exist- 
ence and of right to dominate the lives of 
men. From the earliest times, govern- 
ments have not been content with mere 
physical power, and feeling the falsity of 
the asserted theory that might was right, 
have sought the support of the moral sense 
of society through the claim of divine 
origin. The princes of the earlier eastern 
states spoke as representatives of the Gods; 
the rulers of Greece proclaimed their au- 
thority through descent from the Gods, 
and vindicated their cruelties as being in- 
spired from Olympus; while the Roman 



26 
emperors arrogated to themselves divinity 
during life and deification after death. 
Throughout the middle ages governments, 
regardless of the form, claimed the au- 
thority of divine right and sought to 
found their tyrannies upon the sanction of 
the Church. The French monarchs are 
told that "The Royal throne is not the 
throne of man but of God himself" and 
that they "represented the living God." 
Even in this age of human enlightenment 
we find the head of the nation which em- 
bodies more nearly any other the ideal of 
force, solemnly declaring that he rules by 
divine right and reiterating his alliance 
with Diety; while we of America assert and 
pretend to believe the patent absurdity 
that the voice of the people as expressed 



27 
through the majority is the "voice of 
God." Thus history repeats itself in con- 
stantly varying form, but in obedience to 
the same principles. 

The conception of the state as a moral 
organism deriving its sovereignty from the 
moral sense of its citizens and their re- 
lations of mutual right and obligation, 
enables us to see, and clearly to define the 
true functions of government as an agency 
for the accomplishment of the ends for 
which the state exists, and to understand 
and measure the rights and obligations 
of the citizen. 

The sum total of the moral sense of all 
the citizens of the state may be regarded 
as a great reservoir from which is derived 
the life of the state, and which is the source 



28 
of its sovereignty. For convenience in 
administration there comes into existence 
either by slow processes of development, 
or by conscious will, a government vested 
in officials who are entrusted with certain 
powers of the state and, within the limits 
prescribed, are expected to discharge its 
obligations. But this government is a 
thing distinct from the state itself and is 
only clothed with such powers as are es- 
sential for the administration of the affairs 
of the state and for the protection and en- 
forcement of the common rights of its 
citizens. It is not clothed with all the 
powers of the state and its authority is not 
absolute, for those moral principles of right 
and wrong out of which grow the relations 
of mutual right and obligation existing be- 



29 
tween the citizens of the state, are inherent 
in the individuals, and the rights arising 
therefrom cannot be alienated or vested 
in the government. Among these inalien- 
able rights are recognized the right to life, 
liberty and the pursuit of happiness, the 
possession and enjoyment of property, 
and others which are familiar to us all. 
Since these rights cannot be transferred 
by the citizen, and are inherent in the very 
life of man, no government is or can be 
authorized to violate them or the princi- 
ples upon which they are founded. A 
government which seeks to do this is 
no longer discharging its legitimate func- 
tions as the agency of the state, but is 
guilty of usurpation of power, which, if 
permitted, must lead to the destruction of 



30 
the state itself. Then resistance, by force 
if necessary, is not only the right but the 
duty of the citizen. 

This view as to the character of the state, 
and of government as an agency formed 
for the protection of, and limited by the in- 
herent and inalienable rights of men, has 
been peculiarly manifest in English civili- 
zation. To this fact has been due in a large 
degree its broad and restrained develop- 
ment, its freedom from great revolutions 
which have often been necessary among 
other races to overthrow the agencies of 
force and restore the government to its 
legitimate function as the servant, not the 
master of the people. 

The existence of this ideal has been evi- 
dent in all stages of English history, find- 
ing expression in written declarations 



31 
or in immemorial customs which are 
the basis of the English law. So early 
as 1215, when the idea that might 
was right was at its zenith in Europe, 
these principles found expression in the 
Great Charter wrung from King John 
(which was but an enlargement of the 
charter of Henry I), declaring certain 
limitations upon the government, among 
others the principles that no man should 
be "seized or imprisoned or dispossessed 
or outlawed, or in any way brought to 
ruin . . . save by legal judgment of 
his peers or by the law of the land," and 
that no man should "deny or delay right 
or justice." These principles, and limita- 
tions upon the power of government which 
they involve, were re-affirmed and ex- 
panded by the Bill of Rights adopted in 



32 
1688, and the courts, which were to deter- 
mine these rights, were made independent 
by life tenure. 

Under the English system these declara- 
tions of inherent rights are not a part of 
the positive law. While they exercise a 
potent moral influence and have gener- 
ally been respected, they do not constitute 
legal limitations upon the powers of the 
government which in theory is supreme. 
There is no agency by which an act in 
violation of these principles may be de- 
clared void, as being beyond the powers 
granted by the people. Should the gov- 
ernment be guilty of such violation and 
encroach upon the inherent rights of its 
citizens, the remedy lies in the forcible 
overthrow of usurpation, and the restora- 



33 
tion of the rights of the people by revolu- 
tion, conditions of which we have notable 
examples in the revolutions of 1649 and 
1688. 

During the period of colonization in 
America, the English people were stirred 
by the discussion and defense of these 
great principles of civil liberty and the 
rights of men as limitations upon the 
powers of government. The revolutions 
of 1649 and 1688, which resulted in the 
final overthrow of the claim of absolute 
and divine right (which never had been 
admitted ) , in the English monarchy and the 
assertion of the principles of liberty con- 
tained in the Bill of Rights, occurred in 
the midst of American colonization. The 
colonists came to America with their minds 



34 
imbued with the principles established and 
re-affirmed in these great declarations, 
only to have their convictions strengthened 
and vision broadened by the freedom of 
that simple civilization amidst the ex- 
panding influence of the beauty of the 
new world. 

Both in Europe and in America the 
Eighteenth Century was a period of in- 
tense examination into the principles in- 
volving the rights of men and the just 
limitations upon the power of government. 
This examination resulted first in the 
war for American Independence, and after- 
wards in the overthrow of the monarchy 
of France. Perhaps no people in history 
have been more familiar with the princi- 
ples underlying the science of government 



35 
than that remarkable group of men under 
whose leadership American independence 
was achieved and the American Republic 
established. It is not surprising, there- 
fore, that we find these principles and the 
limitations which they impose upon power, 
stated in the Declaration of Independence 
as self-evident truths, that "all men . . . 
are endowed by their creator with inherent 
and inalienable rights; that among these 
are life, liberty and the pursuit of happi- 
ness; that to secure these rights govern- 
ments are instituted among men, de- 
riving their just powers from the consent 
of the governed; that whenever any form 
of government becomes destructive of these 
ends it is the right of the people to alter 
or abolish it and to institute a new govern- 



36 
ment, laying its foundation on such prin- 
ciples and organizing its powers in such 
form as to them shall seem most likely to 
effect their safety and happiness." 

But the founders of the American state 
were not content with a mere declaration 
of principles as a moral restraint upon 
government. They had seen the princi- 
ples embodied in the great charter and the 
bill of rights, violated by the tyranny of 
power, requiring the blood and sacrifice 
of revolutions for their restoration; while 
the war of independence then in progress 
resulted from a disregard of these inherent 
rights. They proposed to go a step fur- 
ther and create a system of government in 
which the rights of the citizen and the 
powers of the government should be clearly 



37 
expressed and defined by positive law, and 
any act of the government in excess of the 
powers so granted or in violation of the 
limitations so imposed, should be void. 

When the state governments were 
formed, following the declaration of in- 
dependence, these inherent principles were 
embodied in the bills of rights and pro- 
tected by constitutional limitations. The 
bill of rights of Virginia declared that "all 
men are by nature equally free and in- 
dependent, have certain inherent rights 
of which, when they enter into a state of 
society, they cannot by any contract de- 
prive or divest their posterity." And among 
the rights so enumerated were, "the en- 
joyment of life and liberty with the means 
of acquiring and possessing property and 



38 
pursuing and obtaining happiness and 
safety." They also declared as funda- 
mental principles that all power was de- 
rived from the people of a state, that the 
officers of the government were but "their 
trustees and servants," and that when any 
government was contrary to those princi- 
ples or exceeded its authority it should be 
reformed or abolished. 

When the federal union was created by 
the adoption of the Constitution of the 
United States, these principles were again 
reaffirmed, and it was made a condition of 
the ratification of the constitution that 
the first ten amendments, embodying some 
of the rights so secured, should be added 
as limitations upon federal authority. Vir- 
ginia even went so far in the resolutions 



39 
ratifying the federal constitution as to de- 
clare in express terms that the powers 
therein granted might be resumed when- 
ever the same should be "perverted to 
the injury or oppression" of the people. 

But these declarations of principles and 
constitutional limitations imposed upon 
government could have but little more 
than moral effect unless there was some 
agency to determine when they had been 
violated, and to hold the government 
within the limitations so prescribed. 

This had been the weakness of the 
English system. The government could 
abuse the powers with which it was clothed, 
might violate or set aside these inherent 
rights of its citizens which were recognized 
by custom or declared in the Great Charter 



40 
or the bill of rights; but there was no 
agency vested with power to declare these 
acts of usurpation void, and they were 
legally valid, and were given effect, until 
the moral sense of the people became so 
outraged and aroused that they matched 
force against force and overthrew the gov- 
ernment by revolution. 

The founders of the American state, 
therefore, determined to go further. They 
not only embodied the inherent principles 
of right and justice in their fundamental 
law and declared these principles to be 
limitations upon the powers of govern- 
ment, but in the very instruments by which 
the government was created and its powers 
so limited and defined, they provided for 
the Supreme Court of each state and later, 



41 
in the federal constitution, for the Supreme 
Court of the United States. These courts 
were given the power to construe the con- 
stitution and the laws or acts of govern- 
ment in pursuance thereof, to determine 
whether such laws or acts exceeded the 
powers vested in the government or vio- 
lated the inherent and inalienable rights 
of its citizens, as declared in the funda- 
mental law. If this was the case, then 
such laws or acts were void; not by virtue 
of any power in the court to annul them, 
but by the operation of the constitution 
itself. It was simply an act of an agent 
in excess of his authority and therefore 
void as to the principal. The people were 
under no obligation to obey or respect 



42 
such acts and it became a duty of citizen- 
ship to resist their enforcement. 

By thus embodying these inherent and 
inalienable rights of men in the positive 
law as a restraint upon the acts of the 
majority, and creating courts with power 
to construe the constitutions and laws, and 
to declare void any act of government in 
excess of the limitations imposed by or in 
violation of the fundamental principles 
so declared, the founders of the American 
Republic recognized and established the 
essential difference between the state and 
the government; that all sovereignty was 
in the people arising out of their moral 
sense of right and fair play, and the mutual 
obligations which result therefrom. They 
went a step beyond any experiment in 



43 
history and gave to the State a position of 
security before unattained. This is Amer- 
ica's greatest contribution to political 
science and to the cause of human liberty. 
But even that security is not absolute 
and its maintenance depends upon the 
people themselves. The courts may de- 
clare such acts of usurpation to be void, 
and it is their duty to do so, but they are 
without physical power to restrain the 
government within the constitutional limi- 
tations thus lawfully ascertained, if it 
refuses to respect and obey the decision. 
Like all law, regardless of forms of govern- 
ment, the decisions of the courts finally 
rest for vitality and authority upon the 
moral sense of the people — the true source 



44 
of that sovereignty in the name of which 
the courts must speak. 

If I have succeeded in making clear the 
true nature and historical development of 
the state and the sources of its sovereignty, 
as well as the functions of government as 
a limited agency for the expression of its 
life and the achievement of its legitimate 
aims, the determination of the questions 
as to the course of Virginia, and of Lee as a 
citizen, in the crisis which arose out of the 
events preceding the Civil War, becomes 
comparatively simple. 

Neither my time nor inclination will per- 
mit a discussion of the legal details. It is 
sufficient to say that the question of pri- 
mary and ultimate sovereignty as between 
the state and the nation, which was neces- 



45 
sarily involved in the claim of the right to 
secede from the Union, was left open by the 
federal constitution. 

The members of the Constitutional Con- 
vention who believed a strong central gov- 
ernment necessary for the development of 
the country and desired to create a nation 
through which should be expressed the sov- 
ereignty of the whole people which then re- 
sided in the several states, realized that it 
was impossible at that time to induce the 
people of the states to surrender this sov- 
ereignty by express terms. They believed, 
however, that this was the legal effect of 
the constitutional compact and that with 
the development of the country the union 
thus created would become in fact "more 
perfect" until the ideal of individual state 



46 
sovereignty would be lost in the greater 
ideal of nationality. On the other hand, 
those who adhered to the principle of state 
sovereignty believed that it was preserved 
by the limitations of the federal constitu- 
tion and that the true effect of that instru- 
ment was to create a voluntary union of 
sovereign states which might be dissolved 
at will. Thus the seeds of conflict were 
sown in the convention itself, for there 
was in fact no "meeting of the minds" of 
the different schools of thought as to the 
intent and legal effect of the constitution 
with respect to sovereignty which is essen- 
tially indivisible. A study of contempor- 
ary history leads to the conclusion that at 
the time of the adoption of the constitu- 
tion, the states did not believe that the act 



47 
of ratification involved an irrevocable sur- 
render of sovereignty, and, as I have pointed 
out, the Virginia convention, by the resolu- 
tion ratifying the constitution, reserved 
the right to the people to resume the 
powers conferred upon the federal govern- 
ment when those powers should be per- 
verted to their injury. The meaning of 
this language has been the subject of 
much honest difference of opinion, but it 
was undoubtedly construed by a majority 
of the people of Virginia as a reservation 
of the right to secede from the union 
when in their opinion these conditions had 
arisen. 

Instead of being gradually eliminated 
through the growth of a national spirit and 
ideal, these questions became acute as a re- 



48 
suit of peculiar social conditions, and of 
different lines of development in the con- 
flicting sections. The North, while origin- 
ally adhering to the idea that the ultimate 
sovereignty was vested in the state, was a 
commercial community, and demanded 
the broader principles of nationality, as 
embodied in the ideal of a supreme and 
expanding federal government, for the ex- 
pression of its life, and the national power 
to open the way and afford protection for 
its growing trade. The South, an agri- 
cultural community clinging with char- 
acteristic tenacity to old ideals, found in 
the state adequate means for the expres- 
sion of its life, and adhered to the theory 
that ultimate sovereignty was vested in 
the state. This question might still have 



49 
been peacefully determined by the Supreme 
Court, as contemplated by the constitu- 
tion, but for the passions aroused over the 
institution of slavery, which made compro- 
mise impossible and conflict inevitable. 

The people of Virginia had never favored 
the institution of slavery. It was con- 
trary to the ideals and the principles upon 
which this state was founded. While yet 
attached to the British Crown, Virginia 
had protested no less than twenty-seven 
times against the introduction of slaves 
into the colony. In the convention which 
adopted the federal constitution, she had 
led a movement to prohibit the slave trade 
at once, but was defeated by the combined 
votes of New England and the Southern 
States, and this iniquitous traffic was 



50 
legalized until 1811 over her protest. Dur- 
ing the entire period from the founding of 
the state to the civil war, one of the prob- 
lems which engaged the active attention 
of her leading statesmen and thinkers, was 
to devise some plan for the abolition of 
slavery with justice to the slave and with- 
out endangering the security of her people. 
History furnishes no more tragic instance 
of a people struggling against an institu- 
tion which they did not approve, imposing 
responsibilities which they could not 
ignore, and in the end bringing to them the 
tragedy of war with the social and political 
evils which have followed in its train. 

But Virginia did believe in the inherent 
and inalienable rights of her citizens, 
which she had embodied in her bill of 



51 
rights, and had insisted should be a part 
of the federal constitution. She now be- 
lieved that these rights were about to be de- 
stroyed by force. She did believe that the 
states reserved to themselves ultimate sov- 
ereignty, with the right to withdraw from 
the union when the federal compact was 
violated or abused. A majority of her 
people thought that she had expressly 
reserved this right to herself; but she 
now saw it denied, and was confronted 
with the purpose of federal government 
to challenge its exercise by force. She 
did believe that the government existed only 
by consent of the governed ; but it was now 
proposed to establish its dominion over her- 
self and her sister states by force. She did 
believe that the right to own and enjoy 



52 
property was an inherent right of her citi- 
zens which neither the state nor the federal 
government could deny or impair; but now 
it was proposed to destroy the property of 
her citizens invested in slaves and declared 
by the Supreme Court of the United States 
to be inviolate, without regard to their 
rights and without compensation. To deny 
these principles, to fail to stand in their de- 
fense at any cost or sacrifice, would have 
been to dishonor her name and prove false 
to the ideals of her existence. 

Virginia did not believe that war was 
necessary. She called a peace conference, 
but the extremists on both sides refused 
to take part. She appealed to her sister 
states of both sections to compromise their 
differences and preserve the Union, but 



53 
her appeals were in vain. At last she was 
confronted with the question as to whether 
she should abandon the principles which 
were inherent in her being, and become 
a party to an effort to enforce upon her 
sister states of the South a government 
which they did not desire and to which 
they did not then consent; or be true to 
her principles, and sacrifice all in an effort 
to defend those rights which she believed 
and had declared to be inalienable — which 
she held in trust for posterity. There 
could be but one choice. She accepted 
the issue and made of her plains a battle- 
field for the continent, and sacrificed her 
people in defense of her conception of right 
and justice. Virginia failed. The scars 
of the conflict are still visible. The poverty 



54 
which came as a result of the devastation 
of war is not yet relieved; the social and 
political problems which resulted from de- 
feat are not yet solved and may tax the re- 
sources of this and future generations; 
but no son or daughter of this Common- 
wealth who is worthy of the heritage, can 
fail to find glory in her deed, or to gather 
inspiration from her immortal sacrifice 
for the principles of constitutional govern- 
ment. 

What, then, was the position of Lee, and 
what was his duty as a citizen? He was 
not only an officer of the army of the 
United States but, like other Virginians, 
was profoundly devoted to the Union. To 
follow his state was to do violence to these 
feelings, and meant a sacrifice of his career 



55 
with its opportunities for honor and 
achievement. 

But Virginia had withdrawn from the 
Union and asserted the principle which 
a majority of her people had always be- 
lieved, that in accepting the Constitu- 
tion of the United States she had not 
divested herself of sovereignty or the pri- 
mary allegiance of her citizens. The Con- 
stitution made no provision for citizens 
of the United States, but a citizen of a 
state which was a member of the Federal 
Union by that fact became a citizen of 
the United States. Sovereignty and citi- 
zenship were inseparable. If ultimate sov- 
ereignty rested in the state, as the ma- 
jority of Virginians believed, then the alle- 
giance of the citizen was due to the state. 



56 

Of the truth of this view as to citizen- 
ship Lee had no doubt. It had been main- 
tained by distinguished authorities from 
the foundation of the government, and 
had been approved by many courts. Lee 
and other Virginians had to decide the 
question for themselves, and if they de- 
cided honestly, as no one can doubt that 
Lee did, their decision was right. 

But Lee did not base his action entirely 
upon the technical obligations of citizen- 
ship. Like all leading Virginians of his 
time he was a student of the principles of 
government and believed in those in- 
alienable rights of men which are the 
life of the state. He believed that those 
rights were being violated, that a govern- 



57 
ment was being forced upon Virginia and 
the Southern States, to which they did 
not consent; that the property rights of 
Virginians were being invaded and their 
property destroyed in direct violation of 
the limitations imposed upon the govern- 
ment by the inherent principles of the 
state and the express provisions of the 
constitution. 

On January 23, 1861, he wrote from Fort 
Mason, Texas: 

"The South in my opinion has been ag- 
grieved by the acts of the North, as you 
say. I feel the aggression, and am willing 
to take every proper step for redress. It is 
the principle I contend for, not individual 
or private benefit. As an American citi- 
zen I take great pride in my country, her 
prosperity, and her interests, and would 
defend any state if her rights were invaded. 
But I can anticipate no greater calamity 
for the country than a dissolution of the 



58 

Union. It would be an accumulation of 
all the evils we complain of and I am will- 
ing to sacrifice everything but honor for 
its preservation." 

Again, in writing to his sister on the day 
after he resigned his commission in the 
United States Army, he says: 

"The whole South is in a state of revolu- 
tion into which Virginia, after a long 
struggle, has been drawn; and, though I 
recognize no necessity for this state of 
things, and would have foreborne and 
pleaded to the end for redress of grievances, 
real or supposed, yet in my own person I 
had to meet the question whether I should 
take part against my native state. With 
all my devotion to the Union, and the feel- 
ing of loyalty and duty of an American 
citizen, I have not been able to make up 
my mind to raise my hand against my 
relatives, my children, my home. I have 
therefore resigned my commission in the 
army and save in defense of my native 
state, with the sincere hope that my poor 
service may never be needed, I hope I 
may never be called upon to draw my 
sword. I know you will blame me, but 



59 

you must think as kindly of me as you can 
and believe that I have endeavored to do 
what I thought right." 

In a talk with one of his generals a few 

days before the surrender at Appomattox, 

he declared that he had never believed 

that the South could succeed without the 

intervention of some foreign power, and 

then added: 

"But such considerations really made 
with me no difference. We had, I was 
satisfied, sacred principles to maintain 
and rights to defend, for which we were in 
duty bound to do our best, even if we per- 
ished in the endeavor." 

These and numerous other quotations 
which might be produced from his writ- 
ings, show that Lee, while convinced that 
the obligations of allegiance and citizen- 
ship were due to his state, saw in this 
struggle an effort to invade and destroy by 



60 
force those inherent rights of its citizens, 
which he conceived it to be the duty of 
the state and its citizens to protect. Be- 
lieving these things to be true, he could 
follow but one course. In sacrificing the 
ties and opportunities of his career to his 
conception of right, in giving his life to his 
state in defense of constitutional gov- 
ernment, he discharged the highest duties 
of a citizen, and expressed the true spirit 
of Virginia. 

This is now history. Virginians yield 
to none in their devotion to the Union and 
their readiness to uphold its institutions 
and the duties of American citizenship; 
but as they look back over half a century 
they are moved by a feeling of pride in 
the readiness of Virginia, when forced to 



61 
meet the issue, to be true to her traditions 
and the principles upon which her civiliza- 
tion was founded, and to sacrifice all in 
defense of her conception of right; while 
they read in the life and services of Lee an 
expression of the true spirit of his state, 
and the highest ideals of its citizenship. 
We may leave the name and fame of Vir- 
ginia and of Lee to the verdict of history, 
sustained by the truth that, 

"Eternal right, though all else fail, 
Can never be made wrong." 

We now turn to another page of history, 
illumined by the spirit of Virginia and the 
citizenship of Lee. The war was over. 
Virginia and the South had met defeat, 
and Lee came from the field of surrender a 
paroled prisoner, but wearing the laurel 



62 
of the greatest Captain of his time, and 
one of the greatest in history. 

A storm interrupts for a period the 
orderly operation of the laws of nature, 
uprooting trees, overthrowing structures, 
and spreading devastation; but the funda- 
mental principles of natural life, and the 
processes of their development, are not 
permanently affected. The storm passes, 
the sun shines and nature quietly proceeds 
with her work, recovering the waste places 
and speaking to the world her "various 
language." So, the agencies of force, 
borne upon the winds of passion, uprooted 
for a time the operation of the principles 
of justice; and the inalienable rights of 
life, liberty and the possession and enjoy- 
ment of property, which are the basis of 



63 
the state, and were guaranteed by our con- 
stitution, had been invaded — as always 
when force dominates the minds of men. 
For the wrongs so perpetrated there 
was no redress. Yet the fundamental 
principles of our constitution were not 
permanently impaired, and slowly re- 
asserted themselves to guide us along our 
broader path of national development to 
the achievement of our national destiny. 

But there was a profound change in the 
theory and structure of the American 
Republic. The federal union had been 
fused into a nation in the crucible of war, 
and it was now established that sover- 
eignty, which by its nature is indivisible, 
was not in the state, but in the nation, 



64 
that the primary allegiance of citizenship 
was due to the national government. 

That new charter of American liberty, 
the Fourteenth Amendment to the Federal 
Constitution, adopted as a result of war, 
expressly provided for the protection of 
the privileges and immunities of citizens 
of the United States, as well as citizens of 
the several states, and thus created a pri- 
mary citizenship in the United States which 
had not before existed. It reaffirmed the 
inalienable rights of men to life, liberty and 
the possession and enjoyment of property, 
and placed these rights as well as those of 
citizenship under the additional protec- 
tion of the national government. We went 
into a period of war with sovereign states 
joined in a federal union; we came out a 



65 
nation, with the states as political sub- 
divisions of the whole, but those inherent 
human rights and obligations which lie 
at the basis of the state were unchanged, 
and were further strengthened and pro- 
tected by the provisions of the Federal 
Constitution. 

The federal government had justified 
the invasion of the Southern States on 
the ground that they had no constitutional 
power to secede from the union, and were 
in rebellion. If this theory was correct, 
then, by the conclusion of peace, the se- 
ceding states accepted this view and were 
necessarily restored to their position and 
rights as members of the federal union. 
But, with the restoration of peace, this con- 
tention was abandoned, and the Southern 



66 
States were required to accept the harsh 
provisions of the reconstruction acts, as 
conditions precedent to their return to 
the union and the restoration of their 
national rights. 

Under these difficult conditions, Vir- 
ginia was true to the spirit which she had 
manifested throughout her history. She 
had reluctantly fought the war for prin- 
ciple, and now she accepted the result in 
good faith. As she had been the last of 
the Southern States to secede and then 
only when all peaceful methods had failed, 
so she was the first to accept the condi- 
tions imposed and restore her member- 
ship in the American Republic, in the 
creation of which she had borne such an 
honorable part. Her sovereignty as a state 



67 
was ended, but she cared less for the forms 
of government than for the great princi- 
ples of justice and right, which were the 
basis of her existence and the source of 
her ideals. If in the constantly expand- 
ing life of the American people these 
principles could be better developed through 
the national government, then she and 
her citizens asked no higher privilege 
than to express their lives and to em- 
body their ideals in the national life, 
and to play their parts in making of the 
American Republic the lasting abode of 
human freedom. 

These conditions imposed upon Lee the 
supreme test, and in meeting this test he 
rose to heights before unattained, and 
displayed qualities of citizenship which in 



68 
their simple grandeur were unequalled 
even by his genius in war. 

When the chapter was closed at Appo- 
mattox, he returned quietly to his home in 
Richmond, a prisoner on parole; his prop- 
erty had been confiscated; he was with- 
out means of support for himself or family, 
and was threatened with trial and punish- 
ment for treason. In a letter to a friend, 
he said: 

"I am looking for some little quiet 
house in the woods where I can procure a 
shelter and my daily bread if permitted by 
the victor." 

Offers of money, and positions carrying 
large financial rewards for the mere use of 
his name, poured in upon him, but he re- 
fused to permit his influence with 
his people to be capitalized for commercial 



69 
purposes. An English nobleman desired 
him to accept for his use a great estate, but 
he held that his first duty was to Virginia 
and said, in response to this generous 
offer: "I am deeply gratified; I cannot de- 
sert my native state in the hour of her 
adversity. I must abide her fortune and 
share her fate." 

When offered the presidency of Wash- 
ington College, he hesitated to accept for 
fear that his having been excluded by the 
President from the terms of amnesty, 
might operate to the injury of that institu- 
tion, and, in expressing this apprehension, 
said: 

"I think it the duty of every citizen in 
the present condition of the country to 
do all in his power to aid in the restoration 
of peace and harmony, and in no way to 



70 

oppose the policy of the state or general 
government directed to that object. It is 
particularly incumbent upon those charged 
with the instruction of the young to set 
them an example of submission to au- 
thority " 

He accepted the results of the war in 
good faith and refused to be drawn into the 
controversies of passion and prejudice, then 
and since too frequent on both sides, and 
sought by precept and example to induce 
his people to turn from the past, look 
to the future, and to discharge in full 
their duties as citizens of a re-united 
country. 

He promptly applied for restoration of 
civil rights, declaring that it was "right for 
him to set an example of formal submis- 
sion to the civil authorities," and though 
his application was denied and he died a 



71 
paroled prisoner, his act stands as an in- 
spiring example of citizenship. 

His conception of public duty under the 
trying conditions which prevailed may best 
be stated in his own words. In a letter to 
Mrs. Jefferson Davis, dated February 23, 
1866, he says: 

"I have thought from the time of the 
cessation of hostilities that silence and 
patience on the part of the South was the 
true course and I think so still. Con- 
troversy of all kinds will in my opinion only 
serve to continue excitement and passion, 
and will prevent the public mind from the 
acknowledgment and acceptance of the 
truth." 

In another letter to former Governor 

Letcher, written just after the war, in 

speaking of his state, he says: 

"The duty of its citizens, then, appears 
to me too plain to admit of doubt. All 
should unite in honest efforts to obliterate 
the effects of the war and to restore the 



72 

blessings of peace. They should remain, 
if possible, in the country; promote har- 
mony and good feeling, qualify themselves 
to vote and elect to the state and general 
legislatures wise and patriotic men, who 
will devote their abilities to the interests 
of the country and the healing of all dis- 
sensions. I have invariably recommended 
this course since the cessation of hostili- 
ties, and have endeavored to practice it 
myself." 

In another letter to General Longstreet, 
dated October 29, 1867, in refusing to take 
any part in the political discussion then 
prevailing, he said: 

"I have avoided all discussion of political 
questions since the cessation of hostilities, 
and have in my own conduct and in my 
recommendations to others, endeavored 
to conform to existing circumstances. I 
consider this the part of wisdom as well as 
duty ... I am of the opinion that all 
who can should vote for the most in- 
telligent, honest and conscientious men 
eligible to office, irrespective of former 
party opinions, who will endeavor to make 
the new constitutions and the laws passed 



73 

under them as beneficial as possible to 
the true interest, prosperity and living 
conditions of all classes of people." 

In these and other extracts from his 
writings which might be produced, he has 
expressed with his own simple dignity, 
his conception of American citizenship. 
He laid aside all thought of self and of 
personal advantage in discharging his duty 
to his country. While the passions and 
prejudices of war were working their evil 
about him, he sought to teach his people 
to be obedient unto authority, to look be- 
yond to the time when the mind could 
conceive the truth, and then to express in 
their lives, and through the national life, 
those principles of justice and right in 
which they believed. 

We may search in vain the pages of his- 



74 
tory for a character so sublime, an example 
of citizenship so inspiring, as is found in 
this old soldier, idolized by his people and 
admired by the world, quietly putting the 
past glory of his genius behind him, turning 
from all honors or rewards, meeting passion 
with patience, and overcoming prejudice 
with love, seeking to heal the wounds of 
war, and, though denied all civil rights, 
devoting his declining years to teaching 
the youth of this country the duties of 
American Citizenship. This is Lee at his 
best — his richest legacy to mankind. 

No study of the citizenship of Lee would 
be complete, however, which failed to take 
notice of his respect for the rights of the 
individual citizen, and his determination 
to maintain those institutions of govern- 



75 
ment which are established to preserve 
and protect those rights from the en- 
croachments of power. Of this disposition 
we have numerous instances both in war 
and peace.* 

These qualities are in fact the essential 
elements of citizenship, for they manifest 
the spirit of the individual which finds its 

*In view of some recent experiences in warfare after more 
than half a century of supposed advance in civilization, his 
famous Chambersburg order, issued on the march into Penn- 
sylvania a few days before the battle of Gettysburg, is worthy 
of reproduction, as a striking example of this quality: 

"Headquarters Army of Northern Virginia, 

"Chambersburg, Pa., June 27, 1863. 
"General Order No. 73: 

"The commanding general has observed with marked 
satisfaction the conduct of the troops on the march, and con- 
fidently anticipates results commensurate with the high 
spirit they have manifested. 

"No troops could have displayed greater fortitude or better 
performed the arduous marches of the past ten days. Their 
conduct, in other respects has, with few exceptions, been in 
keeping with their character as soldiers, and entitles them to 
approbation and praise. 

"There have, however, been instances of forgetfulness on 
the part of some that they have in keeping the yet unsullied 
reputation of the army, and that the duties exacted of us 
by civilization and Christianity are not less obligatory in 
the country of frhe enemy than in our own. 



76 
expression in the life and conduct of the 
state. If we trace the historical develop- 
ment of states of the past, we find that in 
the earlier periods of their conscious ex- 
istence, wise and patriotic men have strug- 
gled against power for the establishment 
of the inherent rights of the individual. 
So long as the citizen was striving for his 

"The commanding general considers that no greater dis- 
grace could befall the army, and through it our whole peo- 
ple, than the perpetration of the barbarous outrages upon 
the innocent and defenseless and the wanton destruction of 
private property that have marked the course of the enemy 
in our own country. 

"Such proceedings not only disgrace the perpetrators and 
all connected with them, but are subversive of the discipline 
and efficiency of the army and destructive of the ends of 
our present movements. 

"It must be remembered that we make war only on armed 
men, and that we cannot take vengeance for the wrongs 
our people have suffered without lowering ourselves in the 
eyes of all whose abhorrence has been excited by the atrocities 
of our enemy, and offending against Him to whom vengeance 
belongeth, without whose favor and support our efforts 
must all prove in vain. 

"The commanding general, therefore, earnestly exhorts 
the troops to abstain with most scrupulous care from un- 
necessary or wanton injury to private property, and he en- 
joins upon all officers to arrest and bring to summary pun- 
ishment all who shall in any way offend against the orders 
on this subject. 

"R. E. LEE, General." 



77 
rights, his mind was dominated by the 
principles of justice, and he recognized 
the obligation to respect and maintain 
the rights of others. While these ideals 
prevailed the state grew in strength and 
influence and knew the blessings of lib- 
erty and prosperity. But when the civil 
and individual rights had been approxi- 
mately established, and the country had 
attained prosperity, men began to think 
of their interests instead of their rights, 
and thus lost sight of their obligation to 
respect and maintain the rights of others, 
which is the basis of liberty in the state. 
The standards of thought and action were 
thus lowered ; men struggled for what they 
could get, not for the preservation of right; 
and the power to acquire rather than the 



78 
duty to protect became the controlling 
principle in life. The result was that force 
took the place of justice, and selfishness 
dominated the thoughts and action of men. 
Impatient of the restraints imposed upon 
the power of acquisition by the principles 
of justice and the inherent rights of man- 
kind, these principles were brushed aside, 
these rights disregarded, the institutions 
of government established for their pro- 
tection were overthrown, and the state was 
hurried to destruction; another example 
of human failure through the substitution 
of might for right. 

At no period in our history has there 
been greater need for the proper apprecia- 
tion of these truths than there is to-day. 

The struggle of centuries for the recog- 



79 
nition of the inherent rights of men, has 
finally established the principle of equality 
before the law, and the opportunity for 
social and political development within 
the limitations imposed by the principles 
of justice and embodied in our constitu- 
tion. But, as in the past, men seem now to 
become wearied of these principles, scorn- 
ful of these inherent rights, and impatient 
of the restraints upon the power of the 
majority. 

There is a growing disposition to experi- 
ment with human rights, to attempt the 
regulation of every phase of life by law, and 
to brush aside every thought of individual 
liberty. The various institutions of gov- 
ernment, local and national, are no longer 
content to be servants, but seek to become 



80 
masters, and any criticism of, or resistance 
to their acts, is called treason and meets 
with the threat of punishment. The right 
to the possession and enjoyment of prop- 
erty so often affirmed as inherent and in- 
alienable, is deemed antiquated; while 
city, state and nation contend with each 
other in devising means to confiscate the 
property of the individual for public use 
or for the benefit of favored classes, and 
resent any constitutional limitations upon 
their efforts to thus purchase popular 
favor. The idea that taxation should 
be uniform and that all men should con- 
tribute to the maintenance of the state in 
proportion to their abilities, is quite out- 
grown, and the majority claims the right 
to levy unlimited taxes on the small mi- 



81 
nority, and then to expend the proceeds — 
as Athens levied tribute upon her allies to 
her own corruption, and her ultimate de- 
struction. 

Impatient of all restraint and of the slow 
growth of society along the lines of natural 
development, we are now told that these 
inherent principles of right and justice 
which are the basis of the social state and 
declared in our fundamental law, as well 
as the institutions of government which 
are established for their maintenance and 
protection, must be swept away, and that 
we must have a government by the un- 
restrained will of the majority — a govern- 
ment of men and not of law. A great au- 
thority tells us that this is the age of a 
"New Freedom," as if the principles of 



82 
human freedom were not eternal and un- 
changeable and inherent in the breast of 
man ; while a Senator of the United States 
gravely proposed to take from the Supreme 
Court the power to declare when a law is 
invalid as being in violation of the con- 
stitution, as if it were possible to have an 
effective constitutional government with- 
out some agency to decide when its limita- 
tions had been violated. 

These conditions, of which the facts 
cited, are but illustrations, indicate a wide- 
spread disposition in America to abandon 
the Anglo-Saxon ideal of justice and fair 
play; to overthrow the whole system of 
constitutional government; and to leave 
to their fate as playthings of the un- 
restrained popular will, those inherent 



83 
rights of men which are the soul of the 
state. 

It is but another instance of history re- 
peating itself. The courtier of old who won 
favor by appealing to the vanity or self in- 
terest of his king, is reincarnated in the 
demagogue of today playing upon the in- 
stincts of the people. Then it was a prince 
ruling by "divine right" who could "do no 
wrong"; to-day it is the voice of the major- 
ity which is "the voice of God," and its 
will is to be the only law. It is thus that 
the evil genius of force has always under- 
mined the Temple while posing as a friend 
of Freedom, and it is enough to make the 
caverns of that evil genius, filled with the 
skeletons of all the states of history, echo 
again with demon laughter, to see this land 



84 
of boasted liberty thus selling its birth- 
right of principle for a mess of the pottage 
of power. 

Every intelligent man knows that the 
progressive development of society is neces- 
sary; that many wrongs remain to be 
righted before the principles of abstract 
justice prevail in all of the affairs of men. 
Stagnation means death to the state as 
to other forms of life, but any effort to 
force this development, to take away the 
protection necessary to preserve the in- 
herent principles of right while this growth 
is being achieved, is equally dangerous and 
destructive. History, as well as nature 
about us, teaches that human progress is a 
process of slow growth, and can only be 
attained by patient development of ideals 



85 
and the careful preservation of those laws 
of health in the state, which are the eternal 
principles of right and justice. 

But I refuse to believe that it is the 
destiny of my country so soon to abandon 
the principles established by the labor and 
sacrifice of the ages. Like the leader of 
Israel, the fathers of this republic, their 
souls perfected by suffering, caught in 
the distance the vision of a promised land, 
rich with the fruits of justice and lighted 
by the sun of human liberty. That vision 
must not be lost or its attainment made 
impossible through the softening effects of 
peace, the seductive influence of pros- 
perity, or by yielding to the advocates of 
the unrestrained majority speaking, in a 
siren's voice, of liberty. The remedy for 



86 
these tendencies, the hope for the preser- 
vation of liberty in America, is not in more 
laws, or greater license, but in ourselves, 
in the spirit of each individual citizen, 
who carries in his breast the essential ele- 
ments of the state. 

If the youth of our country can be taught 
the true meaning of citizenship; to think 
less of their interests and more of their obli- 
gations; if we can by precept and exampl e 
cultivate in their hearts the true spirit and 
ideals of our civilization, as expressed in the 
life and character of Lee; then the vision 
of the fathers may yet be realized, and our 
beloved country may stand as a beacon 
light to illumine the path of the nations, 
and fulfil the hopes of mankind. 

This is one meaning of Virginia Day, a 



87 
lesson of the citizenship of Lee ; a meaning 
and a lesson which speaks as a call to duty 
to every woman of Virginia and of America. 

The essence of citizenship is a thing of 
the spirit, not the act, for action is but the 
outward expression of the spiritual im- 
pulse. The spirit and therefore citizen- 
ship of this State and of the nation rests in 
the keeping of its mothers, whose greatest 
and most lasting work "is not the shaping 
of frail and perishable matter, but the 
moulding of the immortal mind and the 
fashioning of beings that are to exist for- 
ever." 

If you will implant and cultivate in the 
hearts of youth that love of country which 
leads them to study and to understand the 
principles which are the foundations of 



88 
this Republic, and to uphold those princi- 
ples even though they shall "perish in the 
endeavor;" to place country above party 
and duty above self interest; to maintain 
justice and right against absolutism mas- 
querading in the name of freedom; to go 
forward, yet to preserve the traditional 
spirit of Virginia and to expand that spirit 
until it shall dominate the mind of the 
nation; then the destiny of our country is 
secure, and its citizens of the future may 
feel in their hearts and express through the 
national life the ideals which the poet saw in 
VIRGINIA FIRST, AND LEE! 



LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 




014 443 608 8 



